Sleep does not have a high priority amongst many nation's health policymakers. In the UK for example, the only mention of sleep disorders in the previous Tory Government's health policy documents was of the need to reduce benzodiazepines (sleeping pill) prescribing. The new Labour Government's policy is not yet clear. Policymakers should take note of sleep and its disorders, they cost their economies millions ...
The likely reasons for this are: a) most of us suffer from sleep disturbance at some time and survive unscathed; b) many people have been involved in military operations which can involve substantial sleep disturbance; c) Shift-work is very difficult to re-organise economically so that it makes good physiological and psychological sense; d) Sleep disturbance is not an immediate medical emergency - long-term consequences, such as the development of depression, are difficult to verify objectively; e) a lack of knowledge: medical doctors as well as other healthcare professionals get extremely little formal education on sleep and its disorders. Doctors average a few hours pre-clinical information. In the UK, clinical psychologists get only five minutes.
Nonetheless, the economic costs of not dealing with sleep and its disorders are very, very large. By considering loss of productivity, accidents, development of depression and alcoholism, it has been estimated that insomnia costs the US economy $92.5-107.5 billion dollars per year.
This Congressional report estimated that approximately 40 million Americans suffered from chronic disorders of sleep and wakefulness, the majority of whom remained undiagnosed and untreated. A further 20-30 million suffered from intermittent sleep-related disorders. The report highlighted the consequences of sleep disorders, deprivation and disruption as: 1) reduced productivity, 2) lowered cognitive performance, 3) increased likelihood of accidents, 4) higher morbidity and mortality risk, 5) decreased quality of life.
The report noted that problem of sleep disorders will grow as the age of the population increases.